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Canvas Faqs for Instructors

Learn a lot about MyClasses Canvas with the following Instructor Frequently Asked Questions. If you don't find an answer you need - search the Canvas Instructor Guides or contact ID&D by email suidd@salisbury.edu or by phone at 410-677-6585.

Basic Overview

Through the years, the underlying product for the campus supported learning management system can change. At SU, we have evolved from using WebCT to Blackboard and now Canvas. To keep information consistent, the name MyClasses was created as a general reference for our learning management system.

All credit bearing courses will be created automatically in MyClasses on a regular schedule. Winter/Spring courses will be created in November and Summer/Fall courses will be created in April. Changes to courses and sections are updated approximately every four hours, including faculty enrollments. Faculty will need to request any cross-listed or multiple sections to be combined using the Combine Section Request form.

Online and hybrid courses are required to use MyClasses for delivery of instruction. Faculty wanting to use other Instructional Software, such as Panopto or Turnitin, must use MyClasses. Beyond that, faculty can elect to supplement their traditional courses with MyClasses. Courses are not available to students until the faculty member Publishes the course.

Student enrollment is added to courses approximately one month prior to the semester start date. However, this does not mean that they can see the course. Course dates are set up for students to access courses one week prior to the semester start date to two weeks after the end of the semester. Online and hybrid courses are expected to open for students one week prior to the semester start date. This allows students to review the course syllabus, become familiar with the MyClasses course, and to complete any pre-week activities.

With that said, courses do not display to students until the faculty member Publishes the course. If a faculty member would like to allow students to see the course beyond these dates, please contact ID&D.

No, student access to courses is based on the start and end dates of the course sections, which are one week prior and two weeks after the official semester start dates. Publishing a course early does not automatically provide students access to the course. However, publishing a course early is helpful in preparing for the start of the semester - as this is often forgotten by instructors.

MyClasses automatically adjusts to computer screen sizes and mobile devices. If you do not see your course navigation, the look to the left of your course title at the top for an icon with three lines. Click the "hamburger" icon to the left of the course title to display your course navigation.

The Dashboard displays courses in which you are enrolled. You also have access to all of your courses, by clicking on Courses from the global menu and then selecting All Courses. When in the All Courses area, you can favorite courses to only have those courses appear on your Dashboard. This is useful for faculty who will be using only certain courses in MyClasses Canvas (such as using on the lecture section of a course and not using a lab section). Refer to the Customizing the Course List guide for step by step instructions.

Instructional Design & Delivery provides in-person workshops and self-paced/online resources for pedagogical and technological support for faculty and staff in the use of MyClasses. Appointments can be made in person or virtually with our campus Instructional Designers. For consultations:

The Home Page of your course makes the first impression on your students. Instructional Design & Delivery recommends faculty to set their home page to the Syllabus. The Canvas syllabus tool allows a faculty member to create a welcome message for the course; add a link to the syllabus document or other areas of the course; display grading information; and automatically display a schedule of graded activities for the students. See the How do I change the Course Home Page? guide for step by step instructions.

No, faculty cannot change the names of the items on the Course Navigation. The consistent names of the course navigation provides students with consistency as they switch between various courses within MyClasses. Equally, this reduces the learning curve for students and faculty as to where various elements are found within a course.

Columns in the gradebook are created automatically based on the graded activities and assignment groups that you create within the Assignments area of your course. Assignments in MyClasses is defined in a broader spectrum to include all graded activities to be completed by students. An assignment should be created for each activity submitted online or in the classroom, as well as graded online discussions or assessments.

By default the gradebook calculates grades by points. Faculty who use weighted percentages for final grade calculations will need to create Assignment groups and then organize those assignments under those groups for proper grade calculations. Faculty are encouraged to attend the Mastering the MyClasses Canvas Gradebook workshop or work with a campus Instructional Designer.

It is imperative for faculty to communicate with their students how they intend to use the MyClasses gradebook in relation to the final course grade. Students should be encouraged to calculate their own grades based on the course syllabus. Faculty can also hide the totals from students in the student grade view.

The Student View allows you see the course as a student views it. While in the student view a Test Student is created for your course to allow you to participate in assignments, quizzes and other areas of the course just like a student. At the end of the session, you can choose to keep the student data of the Test Student in the grade center or reset it to allow you to complete the activity again. Refer to the How do I view a course using a test student?guides for more information.

Faculty can add other users into their course in various roles, except for the student role. Students are automatically added into courses via a report between MyClasses and GullNet that runs every four hours. Please see the Enrolling Users handout for an explanation of the various roles and instructions on how to add users.

Enrollment of students in courses is based on the official class roster within GullNet. All faculty and student enrollments for credit bearing courses MUST be performed using the custom report developed to update MyClasses data. Enrollments cannot occur directly within MyClasses due to the need for the internal tracking database to be updated. Enrollments occurring outside of the custom report process will cause the tracking database to become out of sync with actual MyClasses data. If a faculty member has a unique need, please contact ID&D.

Course Management

Based on official student accommodation documentation from Student Affairs, you can add additional time to a published assessment using the Moderate this Quiz feature. The extra time you enter is added to the original duration of a quiz. If you setup your quiz to be completed within 30 minutes and your student receives time and half, you would add an additional 15 minutes to this student.

To allow a student an extra quiz attempt, an instructor can locate the quiz within MyClasses and select the option to Show Student Quiz Results. Then locate the desired student and review the student quiz attempts. Select the Allow this student an extra attempt option on the right to provide the student with the opportunity to take the quiz again.

Yes, by default the Files area is available to students to see all files uploaded within a course. For courses that supplement a traditional course, faculty can organize the files area for easy distribution of information or handouts. For courses with content organized with Modules, faculty often will hide the Files area or restrict files or folders from students view.

Yes, faculty can assign the same graded activity to different students on different dates. The same is true for assigning due dates by section within a combined course. MyClasses refers to this feature as Differentiated Assignments. When establishing the due and availability dates for the activity, the faculty member selects either Everyone, individuals students, and/or the desired section.

By default, MyClasses provides students with various grade statistics (box and whisker plots, grade distributions, etc.) for graded activities. In small courses, this could lead to students knowing other student's grades for assignments. See the How do I hide grade distribution scoring details from students? for instructions on turning this feature off.